In this chapter, we explore the idea of the social world as a collection of patterned phenomena, and how the social sciences attempt to make sense of those patterns. We value the characteristics of parsimony, predictiveness, falsifiability, fertility, and replicability in research. Research questions are one of four types – normative, hypothetical, factual/procedural, or empirical – depending on the goal or purpose of the investigation. Empirical research questions deal with the world ‘as it is,’ seeking general explanations for patterns of outcomes or classes of phenomena. A good research question is one whose answer takes as much space as your paper has length.

Often, students generate a research question, formulate hypotheses, and wonder, “What statistics should I use?” These statistics, drilled into their brains from previous courses, sometimes contain little to no meaningful associations to real-world concepts. It is the transference of these skills (or lack of!) that can hang up a new researcher on how to explore their hypotheses. This chapter brings students through the process of selecting successful research questions and the formulation of hypotheses. Dependent and independent variables are reviewed along with cause-and-effect relationships. The relationship between statistical power, statistical significance, effect size, and sample size is discussed along with step-by-step instructions for estimating sample size.

This chapter introduces the research, justifies the methodological choices and outlines the structure of the book.

This chapter summarizes the main points established in prior chapters and reviews how research questions factor into doing discourse analysis. The aim of the chapter is to help readers synthesize the different aspects of conducting discourse analysis research into a coherent set of principles. This is done by introducing a practical model for doing discourse analysis. After reading this chapter, readers will be able to recall the mains points of doing discourse analysis; be capable of using a model for doing discourse analysis to conduct research; know a number of practical tips for doing discourse analysis; and be able to construct research questions that are relevant to discourse analysis research.

How much of what health and other professionals do is based soundly in science? Answers to the question, ‘Is our practice evidence based?’ depend on what we mean by practice and evidence.

The expansion of evidence-based medicne (EBM) has been a major influence on medical practice over the past 25 years. In this chapter, we examine the nature of what is nowadays more broadly referred to as evidence-based health-care (EBHC) and discuss its limitations. It is worth noting that in the UK this field continues to expand, particularly into the arena of social care, which often goes hand in hand with the provision of health-care. Increasingly, the term ‘evidence-based practice’ (EBP) is used as a catch-all. While this chapter focuses on health-care, the principles of EBP we describe apply equally to other disciplines, including public health and policy.

This chapter introduces the legal definition of ‘charitable trust governance’ and outlines the hypothesis, research questions, and research methods of this monograph. This monograph first defines the governance of charitable trusts as a set of mechanisms that ensure the trustee of a charitable trust complies with its duties. Based on this definition, Chapter 1 explains the hypothesis to be demonstrated in the rest of the monograph; that is, the governance framework for Chinese charitable trusts can only be fully understood in light of relevant laws, administrative practices, and private actions undertaken by trust parties. Three research questions are accordingly outlined to direct the study: (a) how has the charity law helped shape the governance structure of charitable trusts?; (b) how have regulators implemented the legal regulatory framework?; and (c) what private actions have trust parties taken when engaging with the law? Based on these questions, the chapter finally explains the methods adopted in the study: (a) textual analysis; (b) translation of Chinese sources; and (c) semi-structured qualitative interviews.

Like Chapter 7, this chapter also discusses the sequencing of case study designs. Here we particularly focus on the deductive–inductive sequencing. Using an exemplar case study, we discuss how prediction outliers (deviant cases) identified during the initial study can guide the sequencing of designs in further stages. In the context of the example, we discuss the research question, theoretical sampling, cases, levels of analysis, and the potential requirement for additional data collection. Furthermore, we discuss the issue of omitted variable bias and internal validity in the context of sequenced case study designs. We end the chapter with a discussion on how to report sequenced case studies following deductive–inductive reasoning.

In this chapter, we move on from the archetypical to the sequenced case study designs. First of all, we discuss what sequencing case study designs entail. Using an illustrative example, we discuss one type of sequencing in detail (i.e. the inductive-deductive sequencing). In the context of the example, we discuss the research question, theoretical sampling, controls, cases, embedded units, and the levels of analysis involved in the sequenced design. Lastly, we briefly discuss how to report the sequenced case study design.

With a sketch of the debate over the finite/non-finite distinction, Chapter 1 introduces the motivation, purpose, research questions, methodology and L10layout of this study. After pointing out the controversy over non-finiteness in linguistics, four research questions are raised: In what way is the finite and non-finite distinction universal? In what context can non-finiteness be positioned and identified? How does non-finiteness function for inter-clausal connectivity? How will the controversial issues of non-finiteness in English and Chinese be dealt with?

This chapter explains how to design experiments to study black-box corporate surveillance systems. The chapter first examines the kinds of research questions that can be asked about corporate surveillance systems. Then, it describes different high-level study designs for transparency research, followed by a look at longitudinal studies and how they can be conducted. After examining the challenges that transparency researchers face in designing these experiments, the chapter focuses on input variables that are influenced and varied during an experiment, variables that are outside the experimenter's influence, and variables that are measured (response or output variables).

Turkey is among the drafters of the European Convention on Human Rights, has been subject to the ECtHR's oversight for over three decades and is an EU accession country since 2005. Yet, it continues to engage in state violence and political repression against its Kurdish minority. Starting with a description of this puzzle, the chapter provides a review of the literature on supranational courts and legal mobilisation, highlighting the significant gap in scholarship concerning the ECtHR's failure to penetrate into Turkey's authoritarian politico-legal culture, despite decades of mobilisation by Kurdish lawyers. It explains that the book seeks to fill this gap through a process-oriented study of the ECtHR's engagement in Turkey's Kurdish conflict by drawing from methodological approaches in law, political science and sociology, and combining doctrinal legal research, semi-structured interviews, desk research and participant observation. The chapter concludes with a brief layout of the content and purpose of the remaining chapters.